REVIEW: Catching Fire is nothing short of phenomenal

Catching Fire accomplished something that is so rarely done by films: honour the book it was based on.

Katniss and her family are now living in Victor’s Village with Peeta and Haymitch. Early on we see her issues in dealing with the events from the previous year’s battle and her relationship with Peeta has become non-existent, but with their Victory Tour coming, they must put on the act of the happy couple. This task is made even more difficult as President Snow threatened the lives of her family if he didn’t find that act convincing enough.

Snow is threatened by Katniss, who has caused a tear in his fragile system with her perceived act of defiance. He looks to control her so he can quell any sense of uprising from the districts. As they embark on their tour, the signs of that uprising start to become clear to Katniss, and the more she sees the terrible acts that Snow inflicts, the more she wants to do something about it.

Given her defiance, Snow has announced a Quarter Quell, which is an all star Hunger Games match of sorts, seeing previous winners go up against one-another for the 75th anniversary of the tournament. This means Katniss must go back and fight. I won’t go into the rest, but trust me it’s amazing.

Francis Lawrence (I Am Legend, Constantine) took the reins as director of the second film of The Hunger Games trilogy written by Suzanne Collins. I’m not sure if it was the added budget afforded to the team, but his vision of the book is how I imagined it would be, and like the first movie, was much more emotional to watch than to read. This likely had something to do with the strong acting from Jennifer Lawrence and the cast, which was phenomenal once again, including the addition of Philip Seymour Hoffman as Plutarch Heavensbee, who I can’t wait to see more of in the next two instalments.

Unlike the first film, Catching Fire opens up the political discussion much more. One of the reasons I enjoyed the books so much was the commentary made about the role that media and politicians have in shaping how we think and what we say.

If you haven’t read the books and are hesitating to watch these, I’d strongly advise against that. Watch the first one, and see this one immediately as it’s well worth the watch. I give Catching Fire 5/5.